Wrong, not wrongheaded

Leftist idealists pursue their slogans of democracy and peace. They abandon reality, or rather, they warp reality to conform to their theories. In the face of overwhelming and murderous Arab hostility they imagine moderate Arabs and designate them as peace partners.

Aren’t the conservatives similarly guilty of twisting the facts to suit their ideological needs? Probably not. Conservatives come in various ideological flavors: religious, nationalist, and militarist, to name a few. They share a common denominator: a sense of reality and the understanding that it cannot easily be changed by human efforts.

For all of human history, peace has only been achieved as a result of war or the threat thereof. Religions and civilizations have clashed, states have fought and violated peace treaties. To imagine that the nature of societies has changed drastically in our time, to attempt to outfox history, to rely on goodwill, is leftism.

Conservatives could envisage the Jewish state differently: as a religious Judea, as a Middle Eastern hegemony, as a military superpower, or as a neutral economic paradise. Those differences of opinion would surface and clash. For now, conservatives agree in their opposition to the unrealistic policies of leftist Israeli rulers. Whether the government objectives of a secular, peaceful Israel are correct or not, the policies employed to achieve them are wrong. They are divorced from reality and lead us nowhere.